was soon surrounded by a throng of admirers who had come to
congratulate her upon her success.

"Were you pleased, Henri?" she said in a low tone to the General.

"Enthusiastically!" he replied.

"Ah, then I can die happy!" she said, laughingly.

As she traversed the ranks of her admirers to go to change her costume
for the last act, she found herself face to face with Zibeline, who,
having quickly recovered from her emotion, was advancing on the arm of
the Chevalier de Sainte-Foy.

"My dear child," said the old nobleman to the actress, "I bring to you
Mademoiselle de Vermont, who wishes to say to you herself--"

"That Mademoiselle must be very tired of listening to our praises,"
interrupted Zibeline. "But if the tribute of a foreigner can prove to her
that her prestige is universal, I beg that she will accept these flowers
which I dared not throw to her from my box."

"Really, Mademoiselle, you embarrass me!" Eugenie replied, somewhat
surprised.

"Oh, you need not fear to take them--they are not poisoned!" added
Zibeline, smiling.

And, after a gracious inclination of her head, to which the actress
responded with a deep courtesy, Zibeline took again the arm of her escort
in order to seek her carriage, without waiting for the end of the play.

Three-quarters of an hour later, as, the audience was leaving the
theatre, M. Desvanneaux recounted to whoever chose to listen that
Mademoiselle de Vermont had passed the whole of the last 'entr'acte' in
the greenroom corridor, in a friendly chat with Eugenie Gontier.

ETEXT EDITOR'S BOOKMARKS:

Life goes on, and that is less gay than the stories
Men admired her; the women sought some point to criticise

ZIBELINE

By PHILIPPE DE MASSA

BOOK 2.

CHAPTER XIII

THE INDUSTRIAL ORPHAN ASYLUM

When the prefectoral axe of the Baron Haussmann hewed its way through the
Faubourg St. Germain in order to create the boulevard to which this
aristocratic centre has given its flame, the appropriation of private
property for public purposes caused to disappear numerous ancient
dwellings bearing armorial devices, torn down in the interest of the
public good, to the equalizing level of a line of tramways. In the midst
of this sacrilegious upheaval, the Hotel de Montgeron, one of the largest
in the Rue St. Dominique, had the good fortune to be hardly touched by
the surveyor's line; in exchange for a few yards sliced obliquely from
the garden,